The coffee plant is a woody perennial evergreen dicotyledon that belongs to the Rubiaceae family. It has a main vertical trunk (orthotropic) and primary, secondary, and tertiary horizontal branches (plagiotropic). Two main species of coffee are cultivated today. Coffea arabica known as Arabica coffee accounts for 75-80% of the world's production. Coffea canephora, known as Robusta coffee, is more robust than the Arabica plants.
Arabica coffees are conventionally described either as “Brazils” (because they come from Brazil) or as “Other Milds” which come from elsewhere. Typica and Bourbon are the two best known varieties of C. arabica, but many strains have been developed, including Caturra (from Brazil and Colombia), Mundo Novo (Brazil), Tico (Central America), San Ramon and Jamaican Blue Mountain. Canephora coffee provides robusta beans. Robusta coffee is typically grown in West and Central Africa, throughout Southeast Asia, and parts of South America including Brazil, where it is primarily known as Conilon.
Coffee plants produce fruits, conventionally called “coffee cherries,” that turn bright red when they are ripe and ready to pick. The coffee cherry's skin and pulp surround two beans enclosed in a parchmentlike covering. Specifically, beneath the cherries' red skin (exocarp) is a pulp (mesocarp), an outer layer (parenchyma), and a parchment-like covering of the bean (endocarp). The two, bluish-green coffee beans are covered by yet another membrane, called the spermoderm or silver skin.
Conventionally, the coffee cherry is not consumed directly by humans. Instead, the coffee cherry undergoes further processing to remove all of the layers from the desired value product (i.e. the coffee bean). Processing the coffee beans, or preparing them for roasting (i.e. for conventional human consumption), is typically conducted in one of two ways: 1) the dry method, or 2) the wet method. In wet processed coffee, two steps are used to remove all of the layers from the coffee bean: a) using a pulping machine, the beans are separated from the skin and pulp, which are washed away with water; and then b) hulling is used to remove the hull or dried parchment layer immediately surrounding the bean. In dry processed coffee, hulling is used to remove the husks or whole of the dried outer coverings of the original cherries.
For purposes of the present invention, the term “coffee cherry husk” shall mean: a) the husks or whole of the dried outer coverings of the original cherries surrounding the coffee beans and excludes the coffee bean, which is removed during the hulling using the dry method; and/or b) the hull or dried parchment layer immediately surrounding the bean and excludes the coffee bean, which is removed during the hulling using the wet method. For example, for purposes of the present invention, “coffee cherry husk” refers to the exocarp (i.e. the skin), the parenchyma, and/or the endocarp (i.e. the hull) or any combination thereof.
For purposes of the present invention, the term “coffee cherry pulp” shall mean at least the pulp of the coffee cherry but excludes the coffee bean that is removed during pulping using the wet method.
For purposes of the present invention, the term “optically clear” beverage formulation means a haze value of less than about 10 units measured by the test method disclosed herein.